Big brother is eyeing your inbox. Under new government plans, the police and security services could soon have the right to monitor who you're emailing, and when. It's a bit like letting MI5 open all your post and analyse who you are sending postcards to, if not what exactly you are saying. Supporters of the proposals claim that they are merely designed to catch out terrorists. But critics point out that, however it is spun, this is still a gross invasion of privacy – and might eventually put the UK on a par with authoritarian China.

That said, the UK is not yet among the Enemies of the Internet – a list drawn up by free-speech group Reporters Without Borders (RWB) of 12 countries that have most threatened cyber-freedom in the past year. The list, unsurprisingly, includes Iran and China, two countries accused of monitoring not just who their citizens contact via email, but what they're saying too. Iran is perhaps the more censorious: the government recently condemned to death four netizens for their connections to opposition websites. And not content with their existing powers, the Iranian government now plans to introduce a "national internet" – a network that would replace the existing world wide web, and allow the government to better police which sites Iranians can access.

China has imprisoned 78 people for their subversive online activity, while its internet-users cannot search for words such as "Egypt" and "jasmine", lest they get any ideas. It is also now impossible to type "occupy" into a Chinese search engine, and follow it with the name of a Chinese city.

The latest Enemy of the Internet is Belarus, where opposition websites are banned, and cybercafes must show the government the identities of all those who use them. The government has also been known to redirect users of VKontakte – Russia's version of Facebook, and a focal point for opposition activity – to malware sites. And Uzbekistan argues "we absolutely do not accept the establishment of any walls, [or] limitations in the information world leading to isolation". Critics claim they're about to block Facebook.

And it's not just rogue states that are to blame. Australia and France are both "under surveillance" from the RWB. It's argued Australia's crackdown on child porn sites would lead to innocent websites being unfairly blocked, while France's tactic of blocking internet pirates is considered draconian.